Tuesday, December 20, 2016

The Stockings Are Hung..Or On the Floor...

This is probably my last post until after Christmas. We are leaving Thursday and tomorrow I plan on making food/burning spritz cookies all day. Some of you lucky people may have already received our Christmas card. I have last minute gifts to wrap tonight which probably won't happen until 10:30 p.m. because Tessa will inevitably fall asleep in the car at 3:00 p.m. today when we pick up Ben and then not fall asleep until late. At least I will have my reliable paper ripper and scissor pouncer to help me at that late hour.

He sure loves to lay on things. If you receive a present with small claw marks in the paper just pretend you don't notice, OK?

Among the mountain of boxes we received on Saturday was a special one that was not from Amazon like the rest. I decided to order the kids Christmas stockings. We have two matching generic ones that we got for a shower gift but since then I haven't provided stockings for the kids. We are never home on Christmas anyway and they haven't been old enough to notice. Last year my mom refurbished the cute felt ones my grandma made for her and her four siblings when she was a kid in the 1960s and continued to make for the spouses and then grandchildren so now they have stockings there. They are so cute. They have sequins and other embellishments on them. She would hang them on this little 1950's style wood wall divider in her house and it was just covered with stockings by the time I was spending Christmas there. Coincidentally, my dad's childhood stocking is also felt with little sequins and gems on it. His is blue felt and the white cuff on the top is cut to look like icicles. Felt was the material of choice in those days I guess. They are all much smaller than the monster sized ones you see in stores now. There's no denying it...we love a lot of crap including in stockings! Anyway, Ben and Tessa started noticing and asking which of the two we have were theirs. I have maintained this fantasy that I would make my own for them someday and they would have unique ones like no one else has. Kind of like my beloved childhood stocking.

I'm not sure when this was taken but based on the presence of husband stockings I would say it was in the late 2000's. My mom still has the pattern from whatever hokey early 80's craft magazine it came from. I happen to know now from personal experience that log cabin style blocks are a lot of work so I probably wouldn't have made this type of stocking but I thought I would do something unique. Well, I faced reality and decided it probably isn't happening anytime soon. Don't tell my felt sewing grandmothers. My mom already gets it because sewing seven more matching appliqued quilt stockings like these for the grandchildren also wasn't happening anytime soon. So I got down to business and started searching online while trying not to think about how a factory worker in China is mass producing them instead of me. I fantasized about Pottery Barn ones but they are usually $25 not including the embroidery or shipping. I was going to do it anyway since the kids will probably have their new stockings for a lifetime but I was happy to discover they were on sale for $12. SCORE. They finally showed up and I was so excited to display them with the clearance snowflakes weights we bought a few years ago along with the Elf on the Shelf perched nearby. They think he brought them which was kind of my plan but now I want to take the credit for it.

The snowman and kitten princess or ballerina or whatever that is are perfect for Ben and Tessa. Milo may or may not love trains when he decides what he likes but a train is a classic Christmas image so I thought it was a safe bet.

Ben immediately tucked his favorite little friends into his.

Tessa loves hers and kept it by her all day yesterday and asked if she could have it again today.

Welcome!

Hola...I started this blog after my husband and I purchased our first house in August 2009. We were encouraged, as were many of our friends and relatives, to purchase a house by the first time homebuyer tax credit. The purpose of the blog was originally to keep people informed about our various projects and adventures including the fun (decorating!) and the challenging (snow removal, garden disasters). I often stray from the topic of houses and homeownership and write about our weekend activities, our cat, our families, TV shows, sports, clothes, sewing, and whatever I feel like! Occasionally I write about other first time homebuyers and their projects. Enjoy!